Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature
Simians, Cyborgs, and Women: The Reinvention of Nature is a 1991 book by feminist author Donna J. Haraway that critiques long-standing perspectives in science and feminism and advocates for what what Haraway calls a "cyborg" perspective that combines the inidividual and systems perspectives to create a new way of looking at the world and calling into question socially-constructed definitions of gender identity. Chapter 1 Haraway contends that it is a long-standing intellectual tradition to see society as an organic system not unlike that of a human body, and that the relationships in society are heavily based on dominance and the recurring notion of the oppressor and the oppressed, particularly in feminism. Science, she contends, is all too happy to investigate women and offer explanations of female roles in society yet it is also content to keep women at arm's lenght in terms of inquiry and involvement. Science creates a "marketplace that remakes all things and people into commodities" and it is both the thing which feminism rebels against and that which must be understood and absorbed to enter what Haraway calls the body politic (p. 9). The body politic, Haraway contends, is heavily male-oriented. Haraway seeks to introduce what she calls a socialist-feminist theory of the body politic that avoides the characteristics of capitalist desires and biological determinism that are part of the standard definition, and adds that culture cannot (as it is contended to do in the traditional view) dominate nature because they are essentially one and the same. Haraway is critical of attempts by the biological sciences to reflect human society by comparing it to human groups, claiming that they do not simply mirror our own world but instead simply replicate it. This research into animal systems has essentially legitimized the perspective of dominance, which has caused several intellectuals to move away from animals as a source of ideas about society and toward a perspective that is focused on the environment and the way in which people interact with it. Haraway contends that multiple approaches are necessary to revise how we understand the world, though it is worth noting that her own "cyborg" perspective is closer to the latter. Chapter 2 Haraway suggests that studies of primates that attempt to cast their behavior as analogous to humans has created a paradigm in which "sex and economics, reproduction and production" are significant to how humanity interactions (p. 21). Animals, in general, do what they must in order to survive and propagate their genetic material; as such they are generally pushed toward aggressive practices and the more aggressive members are more highly rewarded. This has led biologists to surmise that males are naturally more aggressive and females are naturally more dependent and subservient to males; this has in turn been applied to study of human society. Haraway points out that studies of human nature based on animal relationships reinforce themes of dominance and serve to justify unjust systems, yet she contends also that such studies may be useful to advance feminist thought and that feminists can indeed participate at the level of scientific inquiry. However, Haraway points out that science is often akin to myth for humanity, and attempts to create symbolic meaning for social systems. Chapter 3 Science plays an important role in feminist studies and the world in general because it defines the place and the role of the body in society and in so doing "is part of the struggle over the nature of our lives" (p. 43). Biology in particular has moved away from a study of individual organisms toward a science "studying automated technological devices, understood in terms of cybernetic systems" which has in turn given rise to a hierarchical understanding of dominant power relationships influenced by "capitalist reproduction" (p. 45). Primate studies has also created a paradigm in which human nature represents the components that make up history, rather than history forming human nature. Haraway contends that the biological understanding of the organism has been replaced by the idea of "cybernetic systems" (p. 57). Nature, in contemporary biological studies, is a "series of interlocking cybernetic systems, which are theorized as communications problems" that are then observed "in terms of the capitalist machine and market" such as scarcity and competition (p. 59). In general, most systems trend towards the end goal of optimization, which allows them to operate and "survive under given conditions" though they may not be operating at peak efficiency; this explains why certain characteristics continue to recur (p. 64). Haraway contends that sociobiology is by its nature both "capitalist and patriarchal" and built around the concept of domination; it also focuses on how mankind can dominate nature, which leads to the "sexism" inherent in the science (p. 67). She argues that the socialist-feminist approach she seeks requires a situation of abundance rather than scarcity, and that patterning methods of understanding based on scarcity further exacerbates the logic of domination present in the existing system. Therefore, the problem with using scientific understanding to advance society is that it is heavily influenced by the problems inherent in the system. Chapter 4 Haraway discusses that modern biology is heavily influenced by patriarchy and its male forebears, with even feminist scholars getting their inspiration from male intellectuals such as Aristotle and Darwin, who have "legitimate" authorial claims to the history of biology (p. 72). Feminist scholars attempted to reinterpret "the origin story to get it right the second time, or they rebelliously proclaimed a totally new story" (p. 72). Haraway points out that some scholars argue that "bad science" has been conducted in the attempt to study difference between the sexes as a result of societal standards and pressures that continue to create "bad science" (p. 77). Haraway also notes the importance of language, suggesting that language plays a major part in the creation of reality, and that the role of patriarchal speech and language has created further the relationship of domination and subordination and obfuscated genuine meaning. While feminist scholars have attempted to create a more cooperative system of meaning, Haraway suggests that this has not been completely effective but also notes that feminists have indeed discovered that they have "something to say", though she is uncertain about what that is (p. 80). Chapter 5 Haraway notes that feminism is at least in part a "project for the reconstruction of public life and public meanings", and an attempt to influence "public knowledge" through the creation of "new stories" that serve to construct scientific understanding (p. 82). These stories by their nature not only reflect what is happening in the phenomenon under observation but also show truths吗 and problems that the observer may not necessarily want to see or may not see themselves. Haraway contends, through the analysis of several studies of langur primates, that nature is a heavily contested space and some women have had the ability to enter it and tell their own stories, which is a relatively recent development. Haraway suggests that feminists must strive to "tell stories and to set the historical conditions for imagining plots", as those who live within historical settings create meaning (p. 107-108). Chapter 6 In this chapter, Haraway focuses on the reading of fiction, particularly that of Buchi Emecheta. She justifies this by suggesting that the experience of women is an important component of the women's movement and their role in scientific and social discourse. Experience is a collected "semiosis" of meanings that comprise how an individual has interacted with and been a part of the world around them and can be very influential (p. 109). Experience can affect how an individual views the world around them and in many cases what they gather from research and inquiry. In general, women's experience is wide-ranging and often contradictory, with women having to fulfill numerous different functions and agendas; Haraway suggests that these perspectives form the "tourism of the soul" and argues that feminist discourse must be focused on the attempt to "build connections and affinities, and not to produce one's own or another's experience as a resource for a closed narrative" (p. 113). Haraway explores this concept through the reading of several of Emecheta's texts, arguing that fiction is itself a contested space in which economic and reader interests must coincide and which can provide a "physical clue to circulations of meanings and power" as well as provide identifications and symbolic systems of meaning for the contextual world from whence they come (p. 114). Haraway points out that reading critically and searching for meaning not only unlocks deeper significance in the text but also "holds the readers responsible for their constructions as ways of making and unmaking the potent and polysemic category, 'women'" (p. 115). Through her analysis, Haraway concludes that "inclusions and exclusions are not determined in advance" and are created through the "highly political practices" of reading fiction (p. 123). This highly postmodern view suggests that there are multiple means of reading a text yet there is not one conclusively correct fashion; the interpretations of texts are inherently left up to the individual and their own background and understanding. Chapter 7 In this chapter, Haraway spends some time defining the concept of gender as it pertains to social construction and scientific inquiry. She begins by suggesting that the difference between what constitues being a man and what constitutes being a woman is socially constructed, and (at least in a Marxist sense) is tied to the means of production and economic concerns. Marx and Engels served to create a distinction between men and women based in what were perceived to be specific societal roles based on the natural organization of the family; Engels also suggested that female oppression was tied to economic oppression. In contemporary thought, Haraway identifies that gender was derived from numerous intellectual influences from Freud and beyond, and notes the "second wave" feminist perspective that attempted to analyze gender as a socially constructed concept; at the same time, the idea of gender identity and gender reassignment began to appear during the 1950s and 1960s, suggesting further that gender was a negotiable and selective process. The push toward a dichotomous view of nature versus cultural influence in terms of gender was part of a "broad liberal reformulation of life and social sciences" after World War 2, a perspective that was gradually adopted by second-wave feminists despite early criticism (p. 134). Feminists pushed away from a perspective of "biological determinism" and toward "social constructionism" still built upon the distinction between nature and culture, which Haraway contends ties feminism toward a "liberal and functionalist paradigm" (p. 136). Gayle Rubin contended that in a system where "men and women cannot perform the other's work" and women are used as exchange commodities, heterosexuality is "obligatory" and therefore serves to oppress and limit women; however, other feminists contended that lesbians were not "women" because they subverted the cultural norms of sexual identities and orientations and therefore were detrimental to women as a group (p. 137-138). However, not all feminist scholars agreed with this paradigm. Moreover, most feminist perspectives ignored race and other characteristics. Haraway turns her attention to sexuality, citing the work of Catherine MacKinnon, who contends that female sexuality is akin to the labor produced by an individual in a Marxist paradigm and is that which is often taken from her and appropriated for different perspectives, such as pornography; this has been useful in conceptualizing issues of representation in media and similar matters. Sexuality in this view is another component aspect of female identity. Similarly, Haraway expands upon the notion of a separation between sex and gender through the work of Nancy Chodorow and Evelyn Keller, who postioned sex and gender in particular as socialized phenomena in which men and women were positioned differently in society. Moreover, some feminists' attempts to take an Anglo-centric view of feminism and apply it to women in other societies served to further "orientalist, racist, and colonialist discourse" and led to situations in which minority women were viewed "simultaneously racially and sexually" but not as a woman (p. 144-146). Haraway contends that proper feminist theory must take into account racial issues as well as the social and historical contexts that inform them. She calls for a perspective that pairs multicultural and heterogeneous perspectives with "binary dualisms" that are both "contradictory" and "fruitful" in nature (p. 148). Essentially, her brand of cultural study takes into account both the internal and external factors that define femininity. This plays into her concept of the cyborg. Chapter 8 Chapter 9 Haraway begins this chapter by contending that science is a rhetoric that is used to persuade people of the world around them. Scientific knowledge, she argues, is a practice through which the world is separated into "effective objects" and specific perceptions of the world are encouraged (p. 185). She champions the notion of feminist objectivity as "situated knowledges", or understandings of the world that come as a result of where one is placed within it; while many feminist critics prefer to take the vision of those who are oppressed or underneath the scientific establishment and believe this provides a more accurate depiction of the situation, Haraway contends such a position is problematic because it can lead to the scientist "romanticizing and/or appropriating the vision of the less powerful while claiming to see from their positions" (p. 191). Simply viewing the world from the vantage point of the underfoot is not enough to ensure objectivity; Haraway contends that special attention must be paid so inquirers taking this position do not assume it is the only correct one and suggests instead the collation of numerous "partial perspectives" (p. 191). Haraway advocates for greater focus on positioning in social inquiry, suggesting that being aware of where one is positioned in terms of observing the world also gives the individual the ability to understand not only what is seen but how it is seen and where it is seen from. Science, in Haraway's perspective, should not be an omnipotent force above the fray (this would not be an objective position), but rather an emic approach in which the connections between perspectives and the specific interests taken by these perspectives are used to create a more complex and representative picture of the world. Hers is again a postmodern view which contends that objectivity is not about "dis-engagement, but about mutual and usually unequal structuring, about taking risks in a world where 'we' are permanently mortal"; it is a paradigm without "clear and distinct ideas" and accommodating for the resistance of the world to be "reduced to a mere resource" (p. 201). In Haraway's view, the world is complex, contradictory, and often a "trickster" (p. 201). The role of science is to learn how to decode the often antagonistic approaches to the world espoused by different individuals and through doing so offer a depiction of the world not clouded by the need to remain detached and objective. Chapter 10 In the final chapter, Haraway attempts to create an allegory between the immune system and the systems of society. She contends that, much like the immune system, contemporary social scientists have systems of reading that could potentially fall victim to "pathogens" of misinterpretation (p. 207). She contends that through the interaction of technology, the body, and systems of meaning our concepts and constructs of the body are "made", not "born" and gradual changes to our understanding of the body offer potentially threatening perspectives to the health of the overall scientific system (p. 208-211). Effectively, then, the discourse of "recognition/misrecognition" has served to allow palatable or preferable ideas in and keep out or discourage those that are less so. Haraway brings back the metaphor of the cyborg self here, suggesting that the cyborg self is capable of supporting contradictory and antagonistic perspectives and production. She also contends that operating upon "commonsense" systems of meaning rather than situated and subjective perspectives hinders the effective use of technology (p. 213). In an immune system perspective, the individual must be able to use tactics and constraint to interact with others who are different, just as the immune system allows indivduals to operate within a complex and dangerous world. Under this approach, concepts of "'self' and 'other' lose their rationalistic oppositional qualities and become subtle plays of partially mirrored readings and responses"; effectively, the body simply adapts and responds to other ideas and concepts and adjusts accordingly and when necessary (p. 218-219). However, Haraway cautions against viewing the immune system as a battleground or adopting the "semantics of defence and invasion", preferring instead to focus on the notion that outside information can be potentially beneficial and the body can benefit from allowing them entrance; as she puts it, "Life is a window of vulnerability. It seems a mistake to close it" (p. 224). The immune system allegory, in her perspective, offers a perspective through which the individual can position themselves in relation to the world around them and reap the benefits while maintaining a critical perspective. Category:Books